Mary Ann Nichols.
Jacques was released from prison, given his chore, and set loose. He tracked Mary Ann, murdered the woman, drained her blood into jars, and, at Adams’s instruction, savaged the body and spread the viscera about so that the authorities would not notice that there was a paucity of blood on the ground.
That had been, for Adams, the worst day of his life, mitigated, though it was, by the fact that within hours of the treatment the princess’s bleeding stopped and she began her trek to recovery.
The “matter of blood” should have ended there—a bittersweet accomplishment that he would spend the rest of his life trying to forget. But it did not. Because Jacques LaFleur decided to become Jack the Ripper and postpone his retirement, so that he might bask in the perverse glory afforded him by the hyenas of Fleet Street.
Now, sitting in the grand Osborne House, the doctor closed his eyes and, once again, begged God’s forgiveness. Adams was quite aware that He chose not to respond.
A moment later the doctor was conscious of footsteps approaching. He now set down his teacup, which he had not once brought to his lips, and rose.
“Dr. Adams!” a girl’s voice called.
He found himself looking into the bright eyes of a pretty teenage girl, dressed in a simple white frock, a blue bow in her hair.
“Your Highness.” The doctor bowed as he greeted her.
“Doctor,” she chided in a tone of good nature, “I always insist you call me Alix.”
Adams smiled. “And I always hide behind courtly protocol. It is hardly in my nature, Your Highness, to break with a thousand-year tradition.”
He greeted the princess’s lady-in-waiting, a solid girl, not much older, with raven-black hair. She curtseyed demurely.
He then said, “Now to the point, Your Highness. Please tell me how you are feeling.”
She described herself as quite healthy, no light-headedness, no other symptoms. The girl had not worn stockings and she lifted her hem to reveal the site of her wound, which had healed completely. Even the scar was minimal.
He felt her forehead, listened to her heart, and examined her eyes.
“Have you suffered any other incidents resulting in cuts or abrasions?”
“No. I’ve been infinitely careful, as you have insisted.”
Adams still did not know if the transfusion had cured the hemophilia or merely stanched the blood flow in that one instance, with the girl’s own flawed blood once again flowing through her veins. The scientist in him would have liked to know more. But this was not a patient to experiment upon.
He put his instruments back into his kit. “I pronounce you healthy as a filly at Ascot.”
“You are a miracle worker, Doctor. My grandmother has told me you are to be invited for an audience. She wishes to thank you in person.”
Adams had heard the same. He was not looking forward to receiving whatever commendation Her Majesty would confer upon him; that would exponentially increase his guilt. He dared not, however, refuse to attend.
“I shall be honored.”
The princess added, “And you will stay for supper this evening? Oh, I do hope so. Father is here.”
“I will pay my respects to the Grand Duke, but I am afraid I must be getting back to London. I have patients awaiting my attendance.”
“Even on Sunday?”
“Illness observes no holy day.”
“Of course, I understand, though I shall be disappointed.”
“It has been a pleasure treating you, Your Highness, but I do hope I never have the chance to see you again…in a professional capacity.”
The girl laughed. Then her rosy lips curled into a pout. “But, Doctor, you must understand that I shan’t let you leave until you do my bidding.”
He bowed and kissed her hand. “You are quite the charming—and formidable—young woman…Alix.” The girl’s face bloomed. The doctor added, “I have no doubt that you will someday have the world at your command.”
EPILOGUE
The London Daily Mirror, 26 November 1894
PRINCESS ALIX AND TSAR NICHOLAS OF RUSSIA WED
NUPTIALS BRING HOPE TO AN EMPIRE IN MOURNING
Her Majesty’s Granddaughter
HENCEFORTH TO BE KNOWN AS
Alexandra Feodorovna Romanova
It was a joyous occasion today at the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg as newly crowned Tsar Nicholas II, Nikolai Alexandrovich Romanov, and Princess Victoria Alix Helena Luise Beatrice, the beloved granddaughter of Her Royal Majesty Queen Victoria, were wed before the Palace priest at just before one o’clock this afternoon.
The wedding did much to dim the sorrow that has pervaded Russia, and the world, since the tragic and untimely death of Nicholas’s father, Tsar Alexander III, at the age of 49.
It was the tsar’s decision to move forward the ceremony, originally scheduled for the spring of next year, to today, which is the birthday of his mother, the empress dowager.
Following the marriage, our beloved princess is to be known as Alexandra Feodorovna Romanova, Empress Consort of all the Russias.
As the wedding was celebrated during the official period of mourning following Tsar Alexander’s death, there was no reception and the married couple forwent a honeymoon.
Countrymen throughout the realm rejoice in this holy union, tightening, as it does, the bond between these two glorious empires, and wish the couple a long and fruitful life together.
Crowned heads from throughout England and the Continent were present at the union, among them Her Royal Highness the Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India; the Prince and Princess of Wales; the Duke and Duchess of York; the Empress Dowager of all the Russias, Grand Duchess Xenia Alexandrovna, Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich, and many other distinguished guests.
A Study in Terror
ELLERY QUEEN
This long novella is a major departure for the two Brooklyn cousins who collaborated under the pseudonym Ellery Queen, Frederic Dannay (born Daniel Nathan) (1905–1982) and Manfred Bennington Lee (born Emanuel Benjamin Lepofsky) (1905–1971). Virtually all their novels and short stories were set in contemporary New York and featured Ellery Queen, their much-loved amateur detective. In what remains a brilliant marketing decision, they gave their series character the same name as their byline, reasoning that if readers forgot the name of the author or the name of the character, they might remember the other. It worked, as Ellery Queen is counted among the handful of the best-known names in the history of mystery fiction.
A Study in Terror deviates from their other work in that the majority of it is set in the nineteenth century, bringing Jack the Ripper face-to-face with Sherlock Holmes in a story within a story. Queen is present in the framing sections of the book, introducing and analyzing a manuscript recounting the Holmes–Ripper case. These before-and-after sections, incidentally, were entirely written by Lee and Dannay, while the main section, featuring Holmes, was largely written by Paul W. Fairman (1916–1977), albeit anonymously, with input from Lee and Dannay.
The central story is a novelization of a very good British film with the same title, released in October 1965 by Compton Films; the US release date was nearly a year later, in August 1966, and was at one time titled Fog. James Hill directed the original; the story and screenplay were by Donald and Derek Ford. It starred John Neville as Sherlock Holmes, Donald Houston as Dr. Watson, and Robert Morley as Mycroft Holmes; it also starred John Fraser, Anthony Quayle, and Judi Dench. A different murderer than the film villain was named in the novella.
A Study in Terror was first published as a paperback original by Lancer (New York, 1966); it was retitled Sherlock Holmes versus Jack the Ripper when it was published in England (London, Victor Gollancz, 1967).
A STUDY IN TERROR
Ellery Queen
Ellery Begins
Ellery brooded.
For a reasonable time.
After which he got up from his typewriter, seized ten pages of doomed copy, a
nd tore them into four ragged sections.
He scowled at the silent typewriter. The machine leered back.
The phone rang, and he jumped for it as if it were a life-preserver.
“Don’t snarl at me,” said a hurt voice with undertones of anguish. “I’m having fun, per orders.”
“Dad! Did I snap at you? I’m in a plot bind. How’s Bermuda?”
“Sunshine, blue water, and more damn sand than you can shake a billy at. I want to come home.”
“No,” Ellery said firmly. “The trip cost me a bundle, and I’m going to get my money’s worth.”
Inspector Queen’s sigh was eloquent. “You always were a dictator where I’m concerned. What am I, a basket case?”
“You’re overworked.”
“Maybe I could arrange a rebate?” Inspector Queen suggested hopefully.
“Your orders are to rest and relax—forget everything.”
“Okay, okay. There’s a hot horseshoe game going on across from my cabana. Maybe I can horn in.”
“Do that, Dad. I’ll phone tomorrow for the score.”
Ellery hung up and glared at the typewriter. The problem remained. He circled the table warily and began to pace.
Providentially, the doorbell rang.
“Leave them on the table,” Ellery called. “Take the money.”
The visitor disobeyed. Feet crossed the foyer and entered the scene of the great man’s agony. Ellery grunted. “You? I thought it was the boy with the delicatessen.”
Grant Ames III, with the aplomb of the privileged bore—a bore with millions—aimed his perfect Brooks Brothers toward the bar. There he exchanged the large manila envelope he was carrying for a bottle of scotch and a glass. “I came to make a delivery, too,” Ames announced. “Something a hell of a lot more important than pastrami,” and sat down on the sofa. “You stock pretty good scotch, Ellery.”
“I’m glad you like it. Take the bottle with you. I’m working.”
“But I claim the prerogative of a fan. I devour every one of your stories.”
“Borrowed from unscrupulous friends,” Ellery growled.
“That,” Grant said, pouring, “is unkind. You’ll apologize when you know my mission.”
“What mission?”
“A delivery. Weren’t you listening?”
“Of what?”
“That envelope. By the gin.”
Ellery turned in that direction. Grant waved him back. “I insist on filling you in first, Maestro.”
The doorbell rang again. This time it was the sandwiches. Ellery stamped into the foyer and returned with his mouth full.
“Why don’t you go to work, Grant? Get a job in one of your father’s frozen-food plants. Or become a pea-picker. Anything, but get out of my hair. I’ve got work to do, I tell you.”
“Don’t change the subject,” Grant III said. “You wouldn’t have a kosher pickle there, would you? I’m crazy about kosher pickles.”
Ellery offered him a slice of pickle and collapsed in his chair. “All right, damn it. Let’s get it over with. Fill me in on what?”
“The background. Yesterday afternoon there was a do up in Westchester. I attended.”
“A do,” Ellery said, looking envious.
“Swimming. A little tennis. That sort of thing. Not many on the scene.”
“Most people have the bad habit of working on weekday afternoons.”
“You can’t make me feel guilty with that kind of drivel,” said the playboy. “I’m doing you a service. I acquired the envelope mysteriously, and I bring it to your door as instructed.”
“As instructed by whom?” Ellery had still not glanced at the envelope.
“I haven’t any idea. When I made my escape, I found it lying on the seat of my Jag. Someone had written on the envelope, ‘Please deliver to Ellery Queen.’ The way I figure it, it’s someone who holds you in too much awe to make the personal approach. And who’s aware of our deathless friendship.”
“Sounds dreary. Look, Grant, is this something you’ve made up? I’m damned if I’m going to play games with you at a time like this. I’ve got that demon deadline breathing down my neck. Go diddle around with one of your playgirls, will you?”
“The envelope.” Grant came up like an athlete and went and got it and brought it back. “Here. Duly delivered. From hand to hand. Do with it what you will.”
“What am I supposed to do with it?” asked Ellery sourly.
“No idea. It’s a manuscript. Handwritten. Looks quite old. Read it, I suppose.”
“Then you’ve examined it?”
“I felt it my duty. It might have been poison-pen stuff. Even pornography. Your sensibilities, old buddy. I had to consider them.”
Ellery was studying the inscription with grudging curiosity. “Written by a woman.”
“I found the contents quite harmless, however,” Grant went on, nursing his glass. “Harmless, but remarkable.”
“A standard envelope,” Ellery muttered. “Sized to accommodate eight-and-a-half by eleven sheets.”
“I swear, Ellery, you have the soul of a bookkeeper. Aren’t you going to open it?”
Ellery undid the clasp and pulled out a cardboard-backed notebook with the word Journal printed on it in a large, old-fashioned script.
“Well,” he said. “It does look old.”
Grant regarded him with a sly smile as Ellery opened the ledger, or notebook, studied the first page with widening eyes, turned over, read, turned over again, read again.
“My God,” he said. “This purports to be an adventure of Sherlock Holmes in the original manuscript, handwritten by Dr. Watson!”
“Would you say it’s authentic?”
Ellery’s silvery eyes glittered. “You’ve read it, you say?”
“I couldn’t resist.”
“Are you familiar with Watson’s style?”
“I,” Grant said, admiring the color of the scotch in his glass, “am an aficionado. Sherlock Holmes, Ellery Queen, Eddie Poe. Yes, I’d say it’s authentic.”
“You authenticate easily, my friend.” Ellery glanced at his typewriter with a frown; it seemed far away.
“I thought you’d be excited.”
“I would if this were on the level. But an unknown Holmes story!” He riffled through the pages. “And, what’s more, from the look of it, a novel. A lost novel!” He shook his head.
“You don’t believe it.”
“I stopped believing in Santa Claus at the age of three, Grant. You, you were born with Santa Claus in your mouth.”
“Then you think it’s a forgery.”
“I don’t think anything yet. But the odds that it is are astronomical.”
“Why would anyone go to all this trouble?”
“For the same reason people climb mountains. For the hell of it.”
“The least you can do is read the first chapter.”
“Grant, I don’t have the time!”
“For a new Sherlock Holmes novel?” Back at the bar Ames poured himself another scotch. “I’ll sit here quietly guzzling and wait.” He went back to the sofa and crossed his long legs comfortably.
“Damn you.” For a long moment Ellery glared at the notebook. Then he sighed, sounding remarkably like his father, and settled back and began to read.
From the Journal of John Watson, M.D.
CHAPTER I
The Surgeon’s-Kit
“You are quite right, Watson. The Ripper may well be a woman.”
It was a crisp morning in the fall of the year 1888. I was no longer residing permanently at No. 221B, Baker Street. Having married, and thus become weighted with the responsibility of providing for a wife—a most delightful responsibility—I had gone into practice. Thus, the intimate relationship with my friend Mr. Sherlock Holmes had dwindled to occasional encounters.
On Holmes’s side, these consisted of what he mistakenly termed “impositions upon your hospitality,” when he required my services as an assistant or a confidan
t. “You have such a patient ear, my dear fellow,” he would say, a preamble which always brought me pleasure, because it meant that I might again be privileged to share in the danger and excitement of another chase. Thus, the thread of my friendship with the great detective remained intact.
My wife, the most understanding of women, accepted this situation like Griselda. Those who have been so constant to my inadequate accounts of Mr. Sherlock Holmes’s cases of detection will remember her as Mary Morstan, whom I providentially met while I was involved, with Holmes, in the case I have entitled The Sign of Four. As devoted a wife as any man could boast, she had patiently left me to my own devices on too many long evenings, whilst I perused my notes on Holmes’s old cases.
One morning at breakfast, Mary said, “This letter is from Aunt Agatha.”
I laid down my newspaper. “From Cornwall?”
“Yes, the poor dear. Spinsterhood has made her life a lonely one. Now her doctor has ordered her to bed.”
“Nothing serious, I trust.”
“She gave no such indication. But she is in her late seventies, and one never knows.”
“Is she completely alone?”
“No. She has Beth, my old nanny, with her, and a man to tend the premises.”
“A visit from her favourite niece would certainly do her more good than all the medicine in the world.”
“The letter does include an invitation—a plea, really—but I hesitated…”
“I think you should go, Mary. A fortnight in Cornwall would benefit you also. You have been a little pale lately.”
This statement of mine was entirely sincere; but another thought, a far darker one, coloured it. I venture to say that, upon that morning in 1888, every responsible man in London would have sent his wife, or sister, or sweetheart, away, had the opportunity presented itself. This, for a single, all-encompassing reason. Jack the Ripper prowled the night streets and dark alleys of the city.
Although our quiet home in Paddington was distant in many ways from the Whitechapel haunts of the maniac, who could be certain? Logic went by the boards where the dreadful monster was concerned.
The Big Book of Jack the Ripper Page 104
